The Lightning Between Us

Marcus called himself my friend, but friends don't leave you shattered in a supply closet during an office holiday party, your lipstick smeared and your dignity fraying at the edges. That was three years ago. Now, I take B-complex vitamins every morning with lukewarm coffee—Doctor's orders for the stress, she said, though what I really need is a prescription for forgetting.

The lightning that struck the building that afternoon was convenient symbolism, really. It fried the server room, sent us all home early, trapped us together in the elevator for twenty-seven minutes descending. Between floors fourteen and thirteen, his hand brushed mine—static electricity, he joked, but we both felt something else in that confined space. Something dangerous.

"You're my best friend here," he'd said later at the party, words weighted with things he'd never say sober. I should have known better. Should have recognized the look in his eyes—familiarity twisted into something hungrier, something that would cost us both.

Today I passed him in the hallway. He was laughing with someone new, some junior analyst with bright eyes and no idea what she's walking into. Our eyes met for half a second. I swallowed my vitamin pill dry, felt it scrape my throat like an accusation.

Friends don't do what we did. But lightning doesn't ask permission before it strikes—once, twice, gone. Some gaps stay unhealed no matter how many supplements you take. Some friendships burn down to ash, and all you can do is sweep up the remains and carry on.